


Where we fell apart

by va_lentina



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Emotional Hurt, F/M, Hurt, Implied/Referenced Suicidal Thoughts, Pain, Sadness, Song: Getaway Car (Taylor Swift), Taylor Swift this is your fault, This hurts, bellamy blake is alive and well in our hearts, bellamy was right, canonverse, did i say hurt?, we don't know s7 clarke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:28:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27918244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/va_lentina/pseuds/va_lentina
Summary: Clarke has always had a getaway car ready for the run.This one time, she didn’t have plan B. And he was just standing there, in his white robe, a man she thought she knew but who looked like a stranger now.Madi’s sketchbook was in his hands.or the 7x13 final scene told through memories and Taylor Swift’sGetaway Carlyrics
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin
Comments: 4
Kudos: 20





	Where we fell apart

**Author's Note:**

> So it was _reputation_ 's birthday and I listened to _Getaway Car_ for the millionth time and then I realized that Taylor Swift really said with her whole chest **“It hit you like a shotgun shot to the heart”**. Which. You know.  
> It stuck with me and I kept going back to it every time I listened to the song (which is one of my favourites so– _a lot_ ): at a certain point I just had to get it out of my system. So here we are!  
> Huge thanks to Sara ([@blkegrffn13](https://twitter.com/blkegrffn13)) who willingly tortured herself when she revised this and somehow made it more painful than it already was *cue in you are my right hand you are my ride or die* <3  
> I do still hope I did somewhat of a good job but also feel free to scream at me in the comments or on twitter ([@fleablck](https://twitter.com/fleablck))!

_No, nothing good starts in a getaway car_

Clarke has always had a getaway car ready for the run.

Coming to think of it, the Ark itself was the first getaway car for humanity. The human race was about to disappear forever (their own fault– but whatever, history is written by the winners. And traitors never win, right?), so there they went, stacked and packed in a ship and off to space for a hundred years.

And when the spaceship couldn’t sustain them anymore– another getaway car was set up, driven back down to the Ground.

Clarke learnt pretty quickly that she always had to have an exit plan ready, a back door open to escape from.

A getaway car to run away from Mount Weather.

A getaway car to run away from the Grounders.

A getaway car to run away from Praimfaya.

She had missed on that one– it almost cost her her own life. The others took it, though: safe and sound, off to space again.

In their getaway car.

_It was the best of times, the worst of crimes_

_I struck a match and blew your mind_

_But I didn’t mean it_

_And you didn’t see it_

The whole premise of her life is wrong, she’s sure of it by now. She’s alive just because of a series of well-placed coincidences.

She should have died on the Ark ages ago– and maybe everything would have been easier.

Or maybe not. But she wouldn’t have been there, so she couldn’t have really cared.

But– well, life works out in weird ways. And she ended up caring, and worrying, and questioning herself, and carrying burdens in order to let everyone else live freely.

Maybe she’s not really supposed to be here. This doesn’t mean that other people aren’t either. She knows that, she has always known that. Even though she’s been accused of playing God and toying with people’s lives.

The infamous Wanheda.

But even before that.

There’s a special part of her brain that keeps replaying the same scene in the back of her mind over and over and over again: the first time she got blood on her hands.

That room in the depths of Mount Weather will never leave her– maybe because she has left her innocence in there.

At first, it was unbearable. She wasn’t even able to look at her hands without wanting to obsessively brush the red stains away. It was only after minutes and minutes of frantically rubbing and scraping and crying that she would realize that the water around her was crystal clear.

She would fall back on her knees, violent sobs shaking her body, wet hands covering her face, eyes closed, back in that room, her palm on the lever, the last ounce of strength leaving her body, and…

 _“What_ we _did.”_

It was the worst of crimes, but his hand was on hers.

_“You want forgiveness? Fine, I’ll give that to you: you’re forgiven, okay?”_

_“If you need forgiveness, I’ll give that to you. You’re forgiven.”_

The memories come back to her in this very moment, his nose bleeding the first time, his sad and pleading eyes the second time– and her heart skips a beat.

No.

Her heart has already stopped beating.

_I knew it from the first Old Fashioned, we were cursed_

_We never had a shotgun shot in the dark_

The sound of guns disturbs her sleeps.

The weight of the object pulls her down every time she has to hold it, the coldness of the metal makes her shiver in terror.

Lexa’s bullet was meant for her.

Titus’ horrified look when he realized what he had done… his eyes filled with rage, and hatred, and resentment, and spitefulness when he moved his gaze to her, who was just holding Lexa’s dying body in her arms.

She remembers her slowly getting heavier, her eyes shutting off, like the flickering flame of a candle that’s burning out. The words she whispered to her with her last breaths. Her own eyes filling up with tears, a scream of pain getting ready to burst out from the very core of her body and soul.

Bullets haunt her.

_“I'm not gonna fight you on bringing guns back to camp. I know we need them, but don’t expect me to like it.”_

She did like the first rush though. The heaviness of the rifle on her shoulder. The world seen through the viewfinder. It was new. It was exciting.

He looked like a kid with a new pack of chocolate in his hands.

_It was the great escape, the prison break_

_The light of freedom on my face_

A whole year in isolation did a marvelous job in driving her completely insane. Too bad there weren’t knives around.

But her principles were solid. That’s why she didn’t have to think about it twice when she was put on the dropship and had to decide whether to side with a bunch of delinquents or to make sure everything was okay for the rest of humanity to come down.

_“We’re back, bitches!”_

The warmth of the sunlight on her face was the most incredible thing she had ever felt.

The light breeze in her hair was giving her goosebumps.

The young brunette girl in front of her had the biggest smile on her face, and she looked like she was ready to take over the whole world. Clarke was just about to find out that Octavia Blake could have, in fact, been able to do so: she looked tiny to her, but that was probably because of the way she was standing close to her brother, how she squeezed herself under his arm, burrowing her face in his chest.

Her eyes were filled with naïveté. She looked up to him, and Clarke saw complete and unconditional love in them.

Another tear rolls down, greenish in the light around her. She brings her hands to her cheeks, and there it is again– blood.

She has never seen that look on Octavia’s face again. She’s not going to see it now, after… she’s not going to see it ever again.

_But with three of us, honey, it’s a sideshow_

_And a circus ain’t a love story_

_And now we're both sorry (We’re both sorry)_

He was looking up at her– which is something, given she’s way shorter than him.

The dim lights of the Commander’s palace cast a dark shadow on his features.

There was blood on his face– why did he always have blood on his face?

His hair had gotten longer, the black curls fell unevenly on his forehead, hiding his eyes away.

Someone patted him on the shoulder, and Clarke drew a deep breath.

It was all so obvious. Had been ever since she had planted that knife in Atom’s neck, giving him the blessing of a quick passing, and he had just stood there, looking at her like she was the personification of the Death Angel.

But she didn’t see it.

Still– the way he walked towards her, his pace steady, his mouth sharp, his jaw clenched… it was all in front of her.

He looked past her for a second before burying his eyes in hers. Clarke knew what he was looking at, _who_ he was looking at.

_“She left us to die on that mountain. She will always put her people first.”_

He was _there_.

His hand on hers.

 _“You should come home to yours.”_ It was almost a whisper. His furrowed brows opened up for just a split second, enough to give Clarke a glimpse of the possible world she could have walked into if she had chosen so.

But she couldn’t ignore everything else.

Every _one_ else.

 _“I’m sorry.”_ Her chin raised up. 

He inhaled heavily, his features distorted with regret. He gave one last look to Lexa and went away.

“I’m sorry.”

“Me too.”

_X marks the spot where we fell apart_

_He poisoned the well, every man for himself_

_I knew it from the first Old Fashioned, we were cursed_

_It hit you like a shotgun shot to the heart_

The light surrounding her gets brighter and brighter, growing at the same pace as the incessant ringing in her ears. The gun is still in her hand, her fingers unable to let it go, melted on the trigger that shattered her sanity.

_“Maybe it’s my only way of staying sane.”_

Clarke feels her stomach turn upside down, the horrendous green around her is giving her a headache, the spinning is making her want to puke.

There isn’t a breath deep enough she can take to calm down, there isn’t a scream loud enough to let the pain out.

She looks at the black thing she’s holding onto– when did it become her weapon? That’s his weapon.

It’s _his_ weapon.

What a ghostly scene.

 _He_ taught her how to use it.

Religious people on Earth, centuries ago, used to say “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone”. People had told her she liked to play God– but oh, they had no idea.

About the blame.

The guilt.

The pain.

The everlasting feeling of suffocating she had to learn how to live with.

She was awfully aware of her sins. So much so, that when she had to choose who would have gotten to live and who would have had to die, she didn’t put her name on the list.

Clarke had looked at the piece of paper, pen trembling in her hand, silent sobs threatening to wreck her. What was _she_ bringing to the table? Why would she get to choose who lived and who died? 

Why would she get to choose about her own fate when the others couldn’t?

That wouldn’t have been a lucky coincidence. It would have been a conscious choice, and she couldn’t make it.

_“If I’m on that list, you’re on that list.”_

_“Write it down, or I will.”_

He forgave her. Once, twice, again and again, he always forgave her. When she asked, when she didn’t ask.

He would have gone down to the gates of Hell to rescue her.

He basically did. Like that one time when he disguised himself as a Grounder to go through an army of them, undetected, just to find her, when she was Roan’s hostage.

Or when Josephine had taken control of her body and he breathed life back into her lungs.

(Into her heart.)

 _He_ gave her the stone and _he_ made her believe she was sinless.

It’s like a snake biting its own tail. It all came back to him.

Straight into the heart.

_We were jet-set, Bonnie and Clyde_

_Until I switched to the other side_

_It’s no surprise, I turned you in_

_‘Cause us traitors never win_

_“The good little knight. By his queen’s side.”_

Everyone could see it. It was impossible to hide it, it was just sprayed over their faces, painted in their gestures, written in their unspoken words.

It was unconditional, undivided, and unquestionable trust. The kind of trust that would have made Clarke jump off of a cliff if he had said it was safe.

It was clear whenever she was in danger and he would just run to her, the veins of his neck full of boiling blood, his hands ready to just snap the life out of anyone who was putting her existence on the line. Ready to get his knuckles bloody for her.

It was clear whenever someone mentioned his name to her and her eyes would flash, suddenly unable to keep the steel mask up.

_“You worry about him more.”_

She learnt how to conceal her weakness. But concealing isn’t the same as wiping away.

_“I was just gonna say… hurry.”_

_“You too.”_

After Praimfaya, it felt like isolation all over again. Finding Madi was the best thing that had ever happened to her. And six years are a long time.

A _very_ long time.

When she found him again, it felt like not a day had passed. His hair was longer and he had a beard now– but his eyes still shone brightly when he looked at her.

But something, _something_ , had changed. So small and imperceptible, so subtle and apparently insignificant that neither of them paid attention to it.

Instinct.

When you get ready to leave in a getaway car, you only think about your place behind the steering wheel and the passenger side next to you. If you need a getaway car, you can’t stop and think about who’s gonna take the backseat.

And, if Clarke had to choose, it was a no-brainer.

She knows how getaway cars work. She has known her whole life.

Madi rides shotgun.

_I’m in a getaway car_

_I left you in the motel bar_

_Put the money in a bag and I stole the keys_

_That was the last time you ever saw me_

The dry and mechanical sound of the gunshot still echoes in her mind. She presses her hands on her ears, trying to tune it down, she screams, trying to hear something else, but it goes on and on and on, a never-ending loop that will eventually drive her into madness.

There was no time to think. There’s never time to think when it’s happening. You either act on instinct or you get swooped away when it all goes south.

It’s always the same, old story. Kill or be killed.

Unless you have a getaway car.

This one time, she didn’t have plan B ready. She never thought she would have needed one– not with _him._ But he was just standing there, in his white robe, a man she thought she knew but who looked like a stranger now. 

(Why? Why was he following him? What did he know? How did he buy into that crazy talking? How did he end up speaking in slogans and made up sentences, why wouldn’t he just _explain_? But– was she willing to listen?)

Madi’s sketchbook was in his hands.

The hand that grabbed her arm when he wanted her to take the wristband off.

The hand she squeezed like a lifeline when they had to put the Flame in her.

The hand that always had a place on her body, always delicate in its strength.

The hands that pressed down on her chest when he got her heart to beat again.

Clarke knew his hands would have always been ready to catch her. But now they looked like her worst enemy. He opened the book, his fingers running through the drawings– he _knew_.

And Clarke panicked.

Tears started streaming down her face ( _crocodile tears, like all of your tears_ ) as she realized that his pleading eyes wouldn’t have been enough to stop her.

_Madi rides shotgun._

_Drivin’ the getaway car_

_We were flyin’, but we’d never get far_

_Don’t pretend it’s such a mystery_

_Think about the place where you first met me_

_Ridin’ in a getaway car_

_There were sirens in the beat of your heart_

_Should’ve known I’d be the first to leave_

_Think about the place where you first met me_

_“The air could be toxic!”_

_“If the air is toxic, we’re all dead anyway.”_

Bellamy couldn’t really care less about annoying young blondes who had the fate of the human race at heart. Hell if he cared about the human race– the people who, even in their worst times, were still able to establish a hierarchy and leave the lower classes to rot and die in shame.

He’s had one mission his whole life.

_“Your sister, your responsibility.”_

Screw everyone else.

Arriving on Earth and surviving, though, made him think that, maybe, just maybe, you could ask for something more from life than just breathing.

Or, in his case, fighting.

Bellamy has been a soldier ever since he can remember. His sister’s keeper. He held a gun the first time for her, to get to the Ground with her and protect her once again from whatever she might have found there.

His life has been a constant fight.

With his family. With the system. With himself. With his demons.

He kept them at bay, one day after the other, burying them deep down in his soul, where he couldn’t easily find them, where they couldn’t easily find him.

 _I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid_.

Every time he opened his eyes on a new day, he grabbed his armor and put it on, careful to guard his most sensitive spots. A special helmet went on his heart. His Achilles’ heel.

_“You’re mistaking me for someone who cares.”_

Maybe, if he had said it enough times, he would have come to believe it as well.

Clarke saw right through it. He almost felt naked in her eyes, her gaze able to unveil his true colors, to let him lower his defenses.

At first, it was disturbing. But it was a weird kind of uneasiness, like the one that makes you tell ghost stories and play with the thought of monsters showing up in your mirror: it’s frightening, but addictive.

Clarke’s eyes were frightening, but addictive.

He couldn’t stop looking at her. He searched the crowd for her, he looked around the room to see where she was– even when he was mad at her. He would still stubbornly look at her, and then quickly look away when she was about to catch him.

He wished he could see himself with her eyes. Maybe she saw someone different. Someone less broken, someone less scared, someone less fragile.

Maybe she really saw the soldier he tried so hard to be.

What ties him to Clarke is an unbreakable and undying bond. He realized it was something special when he looked at her face one day and knew he wasn’t lonely anymore– because she was there with him.

He didn’t even know he _was_ lonely before that.

Bellamy has never been really sure about how to call it. Friendship? Trust? Loyalty? Love? They all seem hollow sounds, compared to everything Clarke represents for him. 

_“The only way to make sure we survive is if you use this, too.”_

_“I got you for that.”_

Complementarity. Paired with the certainty– the absolute, complete, overwhelming certainty, that he would never lose her. She would never leave him, he knew it deep in his bones, he would never have to deal with what it means to lose the most important person of your life.

Except– he did lose her. 

For six years, he lost her.

And then he got her back.

There isn’t a word strong enough to describe the tornado of emotions he felt inside of him when he saw her face again. When he saw that shade of blue again.

_“283 lives for one. She must be pretty important to you.”_

_“She is.”_

Something in the back of his head told him that he should be careful, that six years are a long time and that they both went through a lot of changes– something was bound to be different. _She_ was bound to be different.

But he had her _back._

He didn’t have to listen to voices in his head anymore.

Until he saw that gun pointing straight at him.

Awfully, shockingly, real.

For the second time in his life.

_“You’ll have to make it a kill shot.”_

With one, glaring difference.

“You’re not gonna shoot me, Clarke.”

This time, he doesn’t believe his own words. He knows her. He knows the Clarke of _before,_ and he knows the Clarke standing in front of him now. 

He should have listened to that voice in his head. 

She’s crying and he should calm her down, he should talk to her, explain– she’ll understand, she _has to_ understand, because she trusts him, because she _knows_ him. She knows what he fights for, what he stands for, who he cares for. She knows his doubts and fears, she knows his mistakes. She knows he sees the same blood on his hands that she sees on hers.

She knows she’s his weakness.

(Does she?)

All he can see right now is just a cruel joke.

She’s aiming a gun at him, hand firm, conviction in her eyes, ready to pull the trigger and fire his life away.

The same girl who rolled her eyes at him when they found rifles in the bunker.

The same girl who asked _him_ to teach her how to hold one.

_“Ready to be a badass, Clarke?”_

He knows that look on her face– he has already seen it.

He never thought it would ever be directed at him, though.

(Why doesn’t she know?)

Panic fills him, spreads through his body, all of his demons crawl out of the shadows of his soul and Bellamy sees them all, surrounding the one person who used to keep them at bay. 

They look like all the people who died because of him.

Faces he doesn’t know, faces he does know.

His mother is there, staring right at him.

Gina is there too, his own heartbreak reflecting on her features. 

Deaths he’s directly responsible for. Faces who haunt him because, had he made different choices, they would still be here.

They’re looking at him, pointing at him, just like Clarke is. Reminding him of every mistake he has ever made. Reminding him of his greatest weakness.

Their blackness swallows up the torch light in the room until the only thing he can see is Clarke and the greenish glow behind her.

It feels like it’s that day with the jobi nuts again, when he hallucinated Jaha and begged him to kill him.

_“Do you think you deserve to be free of your pain? Do you deserve that gift?”_

Pain is what kept him going. Pain is what he’s always known.

He fisted through life as hard as he could, never a moment of peace, never a moment of contentment. He pushed forward day after day, playing the shitty deal of cards he got as best as he could.

_“We hope there is a forgiving God.”_

Somehow, this pain cuts deeper. Tears apart the last shreds of hope he had.

_“You still have hope?”_

_“We still breathing?”_

Sirens beat in his heart, their dreadful ring echoes back in his ears.

Clarke isn’t moving, and her eyes… her blue eyes could never hide anything from him, since the very beginning. Annoyance, anger, distrust. Curiosity, understanding, gratitude. Tentative companionship, newfound trust. The smile of a friend, the pain for someone who’s hurting. Tearful apologies. 

Hope. His own, reflected in her eyes. 

Love.

_“I won’t let you die.”_

His own, reflected in her words.

 _“You’re too important to me.”_

Her eyes are so different now. Two narrow pits of agony, accusing him of being the worst of her enemies. 

He’s being sentenced for loving too much. 

Clarke put her hand on his heart once. That moment is seared into his memory. 

She’s the one who got him to lay his armor down. He offered all of himself to her. His bleeding heart, she accepted it and cherished it. 

Now it feels like she doesn’t remember any of it. 

The Death Angel is a blurred figure in front of him. 

He should have kept the helmet on. 

Her arm trembles.

Maybe she isn’t going to shoot him, after all.

A flicker of hope.

_“Thank you. For keeping me alive.”_

It goes straight for the heart.

The thud against the floor is a loud rumble in the stunned room.

The sketchbook lies there, forgotten, just a few inches from Bellamy’s motionless fingers.

_I was ridin’ in a getaway car_

_I was cryin’ in a getaway car_

_I was dyin’ in a getaway car_

_Said “goodbye” in a getaway car_


End file.
